Chapter 12 · opening_question
The Yoga of Devotion
Bhakti Yoga
- 12.1 Which devotees are best in yoga — those who worship You with devotion, or those who worship the Imperishable Unmanifest?
- 12.2 Those who fix their mind in Me and worship with supreme śraddhā — these I consider the most perfectly yoked!
- 12.3 Those who worship the Imperishable Unmanifest — all-pervading, inconceivable, kūṭastha, immovable, eternal, stable...
- 12.4 Restraining the senses, equal-minded everywhere, devoted to the welfare of all beings — they also attain Me!
- 12.5 The trouble of those whose minds cling to the Unmanifest is GREATER — that viewless path is very hard for the embodied!
- 12.6 Offer all actions to Me alone, worship through undivided yoga — the mat-parāḥ hold Me as their supreme goal.
- 12.7 I swiftly lift them from the ocean of death and saṃsāra — for those whose consciousness is fixed in Me, O Pārtha!
- 12.8 Fix your mind in Me alone, enter your intellect in Me — you shall dwell in Me hereafter, without doubt!
- 12.9 If you can't fix the mind steadily in Me — through abhyāsa-yoga (repeated practice), aspire to reach Me!
- 12.10 If even abhyāsa is beyond you — hold My work as supreme; performing actions for My sake, you will attain perfection!
- 12.11 Unable even to act for My sake? Then take refuge in Me, abandon all fruits of action — with self-restraint.
- 12.12 Jñāna beats abhyāsa, dhyāna beats jñāna — but karma-phala-tyāga beats all; from tyāga, peace follows at once!
- 12.13 ★ Not hating, friendly, compassionate, without 'mine' or 'I', equal in pain and joy, forgiving — the dear devotee!
- 12.14 Ever-content, ever-yoked, self-controlled, firm in resolve, mind-intellect offered to Me — he is My dear devotee!
- 12.15 He who neither troubles the world nor is troubled by it — free from joy, envy, fear, anxiety — he is dear to Me!
- 12.16 Unconcerned, pure, capable, uninvolved, without distress, renouncing all self-initiated undertakings — My dear devotee!
- 12.17 No thrill, no hatred, no grief, no craving — renouncing both good and evil — this full-devotee is dear to Me!
- 12.18 Equal to enemy and friend, honor and dishonor, cold and heat, pleasure and pain — free from all attachment!
- 12.19 Equal in blame and praise, silent, content with anything, homeless, steady-minded, devoted — that man is dear to Me!
- 12.20 Those who follow this nectar of dharma with śraddhā, taking Me as supreme — they are EXCEEDINGLY dear to Me!